Silly Me
by Guardian-381
Summary: Yugi reflects on his relationship with Yami years after their breakup.


Hey, all! This's just a fic I typed up on the spur of the moment; as such, there might be some mistakes. As always, I don't own the characters, and the song belongs to Melanie Doane and the equally talented people she works with. Enjoy!

Warnings- References to sex, cheating... I don't think OOC, though that would all depend on one's definition of a certain character. (shrugs) For me, this isn't OOC, but hey, if you don't like it, there's a back button near the top left of your browser.

Silly Me

If you had asked me seven years ago what the best part of my life was, I would have replied without hesitation that it was my relationship with him. No matter what had happened, no matter who had called me what, no matter how bad I had done on a test, he would always be right there with me. His soul would cross the narrow hallway that separated us and touch my mind comfortingly, unobtrusively. His presence would comfort me, and he was strong so that I didn't have to be. That was his job, after all. He was my yami, my darker half. My stronger half.

We had our own little world, a place no one else could penetrate. When I went glassy-eyed during class, I was doing something so much more than speaking to him telepathically. I was escaping into a world created by the intermingling of light and dark, love and lust, innocence and sin. It was created when he kissed me for the first time, and every tender smile, every feathery touch had added another dimension to it. It was no longer a world, but a universe. It was perfection.

As I now know, though, perfection doesn't last forever.

* * *

We had talked about the future, a lot. I was usually the one to bring it up, and looking back now, I wonder if he resented it. In any case, we had had it all figured out. As soon as we were finished high school, we would get our own place, full-time jobs, and take night classes. I wanted to be a writer; he would take over Grandpa's store eventually. We'd have a dog, a cat, and a goldfish, and maybe we'd even adopt a child when we were about thirty or so. Of course, by then we would have moved into a bigger place, I'd be well into my fifth novel, and we would have the best game shop in all of Japan, run by the Game King himself.

If reality were only half as kind as dreams are pretty, I wouldn't be writing this.

* * *

It started gradually, as all affairs must. He would go over to his office on the pretence of securing a new sales contract for Grandpa, or perhaps to debate the merits of a new card that had just been released. Soon, though, the visits became more frequent, longer, and in ever more secretive places. Seto began to take him out to fancy restaurants, exclusive clubs, and even a black-tie event or two. I told myself that I was being paranoid as I sat on our ratty couch with my notebook, desperately trying to piece together an outline for my first novel. I told myself that everyone goes through this with their significant other, that I had to let him have his space, that I couldn't be too clingy. That would be certain to drive him away, wouldn't it?

As it turns out, it wouldn't have made any difference.

* * *

One day, he took an overnight bag with him. Not much, just a toothbrush and a change of clothes, as well as a few video games. Seto had been caught in a storm in the States, he told me, and he had promised to watch Mokuba until it cleared up. I offered to keep him company, but he just ruffled my hair, kissed me, and told me that it wouldn't be necessary, that he could entertain himself. That was when I got worried.

I sat there, moving from the living room to my bedroom, from chair to sofa to bed until eleven o'clock, five hours after he had left. On a whim, I picked up the phone and dialled the Kaiba residence, forgetting that Yami had put it on speed-dial one a while ago. I felt stupid for calling, like an insecure schoolgirl on her first date. How could I tell him I no longer trusted him? What if I was wrong about everything? I could lose him permanently.

The phone rang seventeen times, and with each hollow tone my fingernails grew a little shorter. Finally, someone who sounded like they had just run a marathon answered, and I quite nearly dropped the receiver. "Seto Kaiba, and this had better be fucking good!"

"My thoughts exactly," I replied quietly. "May I please speak to Yami?"

Dead silence reigned on the other end. I stood there, frozen, until his voice came on. "Yugi? What is it?" No 'Aibou', no apology. He simply pretended that nothing was wrong, that he had done nothing worthy of reproach.

"Is he any good?" I whispered.

"What?" He did his best to sound confused, but he was never a very good actor, and the quiver in his voice gave him away.

"Is Seto any good in bed?" I repeated, more loudly, and once again, the empty silence took over.

"How would I know?" He was still trying to sound perplexed. Gods, how dumb does he think I am?

"I would think five hours of riding his cock would be more than enough time to decide that, even if you don't count the other nights." My breaths were coming shorter, but I would not give him the satisfaction of crying. "If not, though, perhaps you should call me back in another hour or two, when you've shot another few loads all over his silk sheets!"

"Yugi, love, it's not what it sounded like..."

"Liar!" I screamed into the phone. "Lying, adulterous... put Seto back on."

"Why?"

"Because I have a few questions, and I no longer trust you to give me a straight answer."

I heard whispering, and then his lover's deep voice invaded my left ear once more. "I'm listening," he said.

"How long?" I demanded.

Another pause. "Seven months."

I bit my lip, trying to keep my cool. "How did it start?"

"We'd been out drinking," was the careful reply. "Him more than me. I drove him home, and when we stopped in front of the game shop, he kissed me, and one thing led to another..." I dreaded what would come next, yet I had no voice to tell him to stop. "He went down on me." The way he said it, so detached, so emotionless, made me want to rip his throat out with my bare hands.

"And you didn't stop him?" I began to cry, then, I think, or maybe I was already. It's all such a blur. "Did it ever occur to you that he was taken, that those same lips that were wrapped around your dick were going to be kissing me in the morning? Did you even care?!"

I had always known that Seto Kaiba was a jerk. He's hot, sure, but that doesn't redeem anyone's personality. Unless, of course, you're as shallow as my ex. In any case, nothing could have prepared me for the answer, spoken in that same unfeeling tone. I wonder if that's how he says Yami's name during sex. It must be. "Not really."

That did it for me. Not just the words, but hearing him say them so bluntly. I hung up and threw the phone against the wall, wailing as I'm sure a banshee must, the sound full of anger, betrayal, and pain. Sobbing uncontrollably, I locked myself in my room and buried my face in my pillow, feeling alone, dirty, and irrevocably blind.

Downstairs, the phone rang.

* * *

He tried to get me to forgive him. He sent flowers, chocolate, and a fifteen page letter explaining the entire sordid story, why he did it, and why it wouldn't ever happen again. Yet no matter how much I might have wanted to let it all go, to put it all in the past, and no matter how much I might still want that today, I just couldn't. If love is truly based on trust, then I don't love him anymore. It's simplicity itself.

Eventually, the phone stopped ringing.

* * *

It's funny how your life can change, how you don't realize that you're living in a sand castle until the tide washes it away. It's funny how some nights I wake up whimpering his name, clutching the sheets in sweaty palms and staring out the window, waiting for the sun to rise, and others I simply sink into the oblivion that has become my paradise. It's funny how, to this day, I can see a picture of Seto in the paper, with him in the background, and feel anything from rage to emptiness.

It's funny how, in the end, I survived it all.

* * *

I've sent my first manuscript in to the publisher. It's a story about a guy who learns that it's what's in your heart, not who's on your arm, that really counts. It's a story about how friends and lovers come and go, and how when you're lying on your bedroom floor, crying your eyes out for the millionth time while your grandfather makes dinner for one downstairs, you're still not totally broken. It's a story about me, and the sins that I refused to let shatter me. After all, they weren't my own; why should I pay their price?

I'm twenty-four years old now, and though I might not have that apartment I wanted, or be taking those night classes, or have three New York Times best-sellers, I have myself, and the will that saw me through the hard days and the harder nights. I have my grandpa, and a kitten named Moonbeam, on account of her pure white fur.

I won't be a hypocrite and pretend I don't wonder if some nights, when he's lying next to Seto once the dragon's been sated for the night, if he thinks of me, and what could have been. I wonder if he misses the way I used to make him breakfast, the way I'd smile when he'd say something sweet, the hesitant way I would kiss him as we made love. It gnaws at me like a starving squirrel; that is, until I realize that it doesn't matter that much to me. He's chosen his path, and I've chosen mine. To think that I was ever so deluded as to believe that they could be one and the same reduces me to gales of laughter whenever I think about it.

It's important to be able to laugh at your mistakes. If you can't, you never truly got past them.


End file.
